Hello Everyone, my name is Marcela Romero. I am currently taking Prof. Rogers-Copper class,Violence in American Art and Culture. In class we are going to start talking about the Harlem riots of 1935. last week Prof. Rogers-Copper ask us to check some websites to have an idea of what are the Harlem riots and we also visited the Archive room at LaGuardia Community College to see artifact and primary sources of the Harlem Riots. I was checking one of the websites he posted and one of them was in Wikipedia. it gave a brief discussion about the Harlem riots. It says that the riots started on March 19,1935 at 2:30 pm in the Kress Five and Ten Store. An employee there caught a black Puerto Rican 16- year old kid stealing a candy bar, his captor threaten the kid whose name is Lino that he was going to take him to the basement and beat the hell out of him. Such comment made the kid bit the employers hand in an attempted to ran away , but the manger intervene and call the police. while they waited for the police to arrive a woman was yelling that they've beaten the child up and ambulance came and treated the employees wounds, this had confirm the woman story and that the kid was beaten to death. This woman was arrested for disorderly conduct and the Kress Five and Ten store was closed early. Later in the early evening a group called Young Liberators started a demonstration [like a strike] outside the store, drawing thousands of people and they started a distribution of papers with the headline "Child Brutally Beaten" and another one said a 12 year old got beaten to death for taking a piece of candy. Chaos erupted an at some point some one throw a rock at the store window, glass shattering and a riot has began.
This incident reminded me of what going on today. For example what's happening in Ferguson, Missouri. with the guy Mike Brown, who allegedly had an argument with a police officer Darren Wilson and things heated up and a shooting happen where Brown was shot and died there. After the the incident was broadcast through news, newspapers and social media, riots started striking all over Ferguson and the united states.
Another incident was what happen to Trevon Martin who was shot by a neighborhood watcher, Zimmerman who claimed the teen was beating him up and believe he was armed, He called the police and the police told him not to follow him that help was on its way, Zimmerman refuse and shot Martin, Killing him.
My point is that it seem many things that happen in the past are staring to happen in the present. Its like history is repeating it self. riots always happen in Florida[ were this incident took place] and also nation wide. Riots are something people do to protest for what going on, the injustice that happening to them and riots help specially with social media now, it shows the world know what going on.
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